Robert G Ramsay
Professor Robert G. Ramsay, Senior Principal Research Fellow, Division of Research, Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, Melbourne, Australia. rob.ramsay@petermac.org
Until recently Rob was co-head of the gastroenterology (GI) cancer program and head of the Differentiation and Transcription Laboratory at Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre. He is a molecular biologist by training and specializing in transcriptional regulation. His career-long interest in the oncoprotein MYB began in New York and has continued to this day moving from biochemistry to clinical trials. He is arguably the leader in the role of MYB in tumourigenesis. Over the last decade and a half, he has shifted his lab’s focus to the areas of tumour immunology, immune gene dysregulation and associated inflammation-mediated events that predispose to carcinogenesis.
As a member of the lower GI tumour stream multidisciplinary team, he has genuine engagement in the management of patients with cancer journey and continues to supervise surgeon-PhD students particularly with Surgical Oncology Head, Prof Sandy Heriot. He has led the laboratory/translational aspects of several clinical trials. The first in 2005 – a Phase II Trial of Thalidomide and Celecoxib in Multiple Myeloma and subsequently surgery trials CIGAR4, PERIPROTECT, MATCH and GI immunotherapy trials TARGOVAX-TGO-02, MYPHSIMO and AVEREC.
He is a Board Director and Company Secretary of the Australasian Gastrointestinal Trials Group, an organization focused on clinical trial development and delivery.
His lab pioneered the use of organoids along with innovative immune function assays publishing the first use of mouse and human colorectal cancer organoids in Australia. Rob’s major disease expertise is CRC, peritoneal carcinomatosis, HPV-driven perineal squamous cell carcinomas (eg, anal, penile) and the rare cancer-adenoid cystic carcinoma. Recent developments in photodynamic agents by Invion, Inc combined with immunotherapies have been embraced to address a clinical gap in the management of anal and other SCCs through the development of a proposed trial - PHOTOCHECK
Abstracts this author is presenting: